December 4

December 4: On the border.
Crossing the border between EU countries is pretty easy … if you have an EU passport. If you don’t, here’s how it goes. (1) Pull up to the guard window and hand him your passports and car paperwork. (2) Get directed to pull over to some vague, not-clearly-marked spot out of the way of the rest of the vehicles passing through. (3) Wait. Worry that someone has made off with your passports. Try to explain all of this to the kids in the backseat. (4) Approach the guard station on foot just to make sure there’s no problem. Get told to wait in the car by a very gruff, Schwarzenegger-like guard. (5) Repeat step 3. (6) Repeat step 5. (7) Take your passports from the guard when he approaches your window and be on your merry way.

This shot of the Hungarian-Romanian border crossing was taken from the passenger seat of our car while we waited to re-enter Romania.